By Tom Breihan on April 18, 2011 at 2:40 p.m. EDT

If you had started out your year by releasing your first-ever number one album, you'd probably want to spend the rest of the year on tour, playing for all the people who bought your record. The Decemberists are doing exactly that. The band has already been on the road ever since releasing The King Is Dead back in January, and they've just announced a fresh round of North American tour dates. This one will carry them through to August, and it includes stops at festivals like the Newport Folk Festival and Outside Lands.

Below, we've got all the band's tour dates, as well as their video for "This Is Why We Fight".

By Larry Fitzmaurice on April 14, 2011 at 9:50 a.m. EDT

Front page photo by Joseph Mohan

Vevo has the video for "This Is Why We Fight", a strummy strummer from the Decemberists' latest, The King Is Dead. The video is something of a super-serious affair, with well-shot footage of young adults and children dressed in old-timey, Decemberist-y military garb dealing with the trials of the battlefield with looks of hopeless ennui. Check out the video below.

By Tom Breihan on March 7, 2011 at 2:35 p.m. EST

After scoring a Billboard #1 earlier this year with The King Is Dead, the Decemberists are rolling straight on ahead, touring heavily for the first half of the year. The Portland band just announced a fresh round of North American dates, including a few shows with Best Coast. They're in Europe right now, and they're also planning to stop at a few festivals in the months ahead. We've got their dates below, as well as a video of them playing the King Is Dead track "Down by the Water" with guest Gillian Welch on "Conan".

By Pitchfork on February 7, 2011 at 1:50 p.m. EST

Their new album The King Is Dead debuted at a mind-boggling number one on the Billboard 200, and now the Decemberists are preparing to tour even harder. After the band gets back from Europe in April, they'll continue a long trek across North America, which includes stops at festivals like Sasquatch!, the New Orleans Jazzfest, and the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. We've got all their dates below.

On Friday night, the band stopped by Chicago's Riviera Theatre, with Baltimore duo Wye Oak opening. Photographer Joseph Mohan was there to document it. We've got a few photos after the jump, and head over to our photo book for a set of full-size shots of both bands. Also, stop by our Facebook page for even more photos.

By Larry Fitzmaurice on February 2, 2011 at 3:35 p.m. EST

Photo by Autumn de Wilde

Colin Meloy and his chart-topping band of folk-poppers in the Decemberists contributed a song to a forthcoming episode of the Nick Jr. kids show "Yo GabbaGabba", and Rolling Stone has the clip of the band's contribution. Unlike previous show guests like the Flaming Lips and Mos Def, the Decemberists don't physically appear on the show, but they do lend the whimsical, piano-led "The Great Outdoors" to a cartoon about how "animals have a home of their own." From the song title alone, you can probably guess where that home is. Check out the clip below.

By Larry Fitzmaurice on January 26, 2011 at 9:50 a.m. EST

The Decemberists' latest, the countrified The King Is Dead, is the number one album in the U.S. this very moment. According to a press release, 93,567 copies were sold last week. Pretty cool that an indie-folk-leaning outfit named after a Russian uprising can hold the top spot on the Billboard 200 these days. And pretty amazing considering that their last album, 2009'sThe Hazards of Love, sold 19,000 in its first and biggest week, according to Billboard.

By Tom Breihan on January 3, 2011 at 10:40 a.m. EST

The King Is Dead, the country-informed new album from eloquent indie all-stars the Decemberists, drops January 17 in Europe via Rough Trade and a day later in North America via Capitol. Right now, though, you can hear the whole thing over at NPR Music's website; click here to stream it.

By Tom Breihan on December 13, 2010 at 4:50 p.m. EST

Even when frontman Colin Meloy grows his mutton chops all the way out Wolfman-style, very little about the Decemberists screams "Deadhead". But people can surprise you. On their new 7" single, the Decemberists cover the Grateful Dead's "Row Jimmy".

By Tom Breihan on December 9, 2010 at 9:15 a.m. EST

The Decemberists regularly perform with stage props and weave complicated storylines into their songs. Their 2009 album The Hazards of Love was a rock opera that they performed in full on tour. You're never going to believe this, but frontmanColin Meloy grew up doing theater. For years, talk has swirled about Meloy writing a Broadway musical; in 2007, he told The Portland Mercury, "There was one that nearly worked out, but it fell through. It was based on Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, which is the prequel to Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie."

As Billboard reports, that talk has surfaced once again. Talking to Billboard, Meloy notes that "people are always asking me to write musicals", and this time, one of those people is somebody with some pull: "It happens that the director Michael Mayer, who directed Green Day's American Idiot musical on Broadway, is the guy that got me going about doing a musical. We're still talking and there's potential for a musical down the line, for sure."